The Wolf Man

"Abandon all hope ye who enter here," warns the sign greeting guests to the Gates of Hell – as if they even had to say it.

Welcome to Halloween Horror Nights at California's Universal Studios Hollywood, which, like its sister park in Orlando, Fla., decks itself out on select nights this month for that scariest of holidays. Having frightened brave-hearted visitors witless since 2006, Universal's multiple walk-through horror mazes include this year's newest attraction, a ghoul-filled Dead Inside zombie apocalypse inspired by AMC's The Walking Dead (whose third season premieres Oct. 14).

"You need to be emotionally involved in order to be drawn into the horror," Halloween Horror Nights creative director John Murdy, stepping over empty shotgun shells amid the piped-in ersatz scent of rotting corpses, recently told PEOPLE at the entrance to the Walking Dead maze, which features actual scenes and props from the series.